The Fever is the fourth episode of Season One and the overall fourth episode of the series Pose. It premiered on June 24, 2018, on FX.
Synopsis[]
Candy's insecurities about her appearance are heightened when she is criticized at a ball. Blanca worries when Damon and Ricky have a medical scare that threatens to tear them apart.
Plot[]
The House of Abundance sit by a ball in which the emcee Pray Tell oversees a plus-sized body category, judges presiding over many different women that walked. Candy Abundance vocalizes that she sought a desire to walk the category, much to her Mother Elektra's dismay to hold her child accountable for her actions. In an act of defiance, she walks, being read by Pray. Between nasty exchanges, Candy finds herself in last place for the walk. Frustrated, she rushes out the ballroom, smoking a cigarette alone. Angel Evangelista approaches to provide comfort but is initially pushed away. She reminds her that she hopes to be an aid for her fellow sister regardless of house and that she, too, understood the pressures to conform to the standards of the community to be a certain way, continuing onward to suggest a woman she had contacts to in order to obtain a new body.
At dance class, Damon practices the moves rehearsed by teacher Helena St. Rogers. Afterwards, he approaches her about the opportunity to join in a showcase; though she informed him that the showcase was more for experienced dancers in the senior classes, he pushes onward, suggesting he was just as good, better, than the seniors. Damon is given the opportunity to perform in the showcase.
Elsewhere in the city, Angel and Candy meet with Clarissa, a nurse that established her work from her former occupation with a white doctor uptown. She answered Candy's anxious questions about the silicone injections and their risks. Deciding to settle on receiving the injections, Candy becomes shocked at Clarissa's price for one liter of silicone.
During rehearsal of the showcase performance, Damon gradually becomes physically unwell. As his body slowed in the motions, he walks aside to hydrate, leading to him vomiting into a nearby trash bin. Despite his protests that he was only overexerting himself, Helena instructs him to go home for the day. At home, he rests on a mattress while his mother Blanca Evangelista took his temperature and vapor rubbed his back in an effort to break the fever. She also questioned him on other classmates with the flu, his symptoms, and his last activities from days before. Upon asking him about his prior sexual intercourse with Ricky, he confesses that they used condoms with the exception of one incident in which it slipped off. Before she pressed further, he curled back to bed, groaning over the questions.
Resting on a mattress, Damon is checked by Blanca on his ill health.
Later the day, Angel visited Damon, giving him a bowl of chicken noodle soup to aid in his recovery. Eating a spoonful, he asks Angel about Mother's questions earlier in the day. She replied that Blanca had fears that he was seroconverting, believing he may have HIV.
The following day, Elektra Abundance walks upward to her financer's bedroom, finding a freshly showered Dick Ford prepared for their sexual affair. Once the fumes have settled, Elektra brings up the subject of her sex-reassignment surgery. She is confronted with an aggravated Dick who repeats that he wishes for her to remain as she was, while Elektra protests that she seeks to receive the transformation regardless.
Preparing for the family to walk an upcoming ball category, Elektra makes known that she sought her financer for her sex change but was reminded of her uniqueness. Walking into the room, Candy becomes a target of criticism again, first from Elektra, who pushes that she did not possess the needed assets to pass in her new body, and soon from Pray Tell and the audience for the lacking realness. In a fit of anger, she leaves the building.
Elektra takes a shot by the bar, her child Lemar calling for her to walk the femme queen body category. While she receives her universal approval from the audience and judges, she swiftly becomes a challenge for the fully-transitioned Aphrodite Xtravaganza. After the two claim their scores and their runner-up and grand prize trophies, they move to the 24-hour dinner to bond over Aphrodite's sex change, conversing over their different experiences with the surgery and its benefits and consequences. Aphrodite motivates Elektra to take the opportunity to get the operation for herself rather than her suitor's interests.
A new day arises, Ricky checks on the well-being of his boyfriend Damon. Damon approaches him with questions on his HIV-status and his pervious sexual encounters. Becoming aggressively paranoid to Ricky's light humors and inability to recount his past affairs before him, the two boys run into conflict over their few risky encounters, unaware of Blanca's eavesdropping through the walls. She later relays the news to Pray Tell over the boys' issue and their ignorance of the Virus. In an effort to get the boys educated on HIV, Blanca purposes that Pray take them on a trip to the clinic to get tested, including himself, who confessed to have stopped getting tested long ago.
Pray Tell gathered with the boys, Ricky, Lil Papi, and a weeks-recovered Damon in a dinner, announcing that he plans to take everyone to be tested for HIV.
Searching for an alternate access to silicone injections, Candy and Angel find Miss Orlando, disturbed by her outward, botched appearance, who offers her own batch of injections imported from Honduras. Providing money upfront, Candy requests that she receive injections in her upper thighs, while Angel expressed hesitancy.
Making a trip to the clinic the next day, the men each patiently waited to have their blood drawn, Damon first, followed by Ricky, Papi, and lastly Pray Tell. Afterwards, Pray emceed the next ball, holding another femme body category. Preparing to walk, Candy asks Angel if she, too, was hot. Angel relayed that a flu could be moving around the community, though it is brushed aside. The crowd, judges, and emcee glazed their eyes onto Candy, cheering and complimenting her on her reformed appearance, scores all tens. Raising her arms high and her eyes onto the spotlight, the sweaty woman becomes light-headed and collapses to the floor.
Candy returns to the studio apartment, observed by an unusually motherly Elektra. Between the two women, Candy pressures that they live two different realities on how their appearances and attributes. In a moment of vulnerability, Mother Elektra confesses that despite her financer's fetishization, she was uncomfortable with her body, deciding to move forward in getting the surgery.
Stan and Angel attempt to engage in sexual intercourse at their apartment; though he excused his lack of arousal, Angel confronted him further on the issue. In a heated argument, she expressed frustration over his conflicting desires, Stan confessing his fascination over trans women since finding a pornographic magazine in his adolescence. Soon she shouts for him to leave.
At the clinic, the nurses called in the men to share their results of their tests. Damon, Ricky, and Papi all were informed that they were HIV-negative. Conversely, Pray Tell was told by the nurse that his blood was positive for the Virus. After shedding tears over the revelation, he pulls himself together and lies to the young men about his status, the group celebrating.
Later, he meets with Blanca for a fancy dress she plans to wear to Damon's dance performance. There, he tells Blanca that he lied to the children about his HIV-status, much to Blanca's dismay. While Pray began to spiral into dispair, Blanca repeatedly tries to speak optimistically of the future, that medicine will advance far enough for a cure.
Meeting with the urologist, Elektra asks about the surgery's discomfort and tearfully confesses to her the sacrifice of a long-time relationship with a man. Eventually, she signs the form to begin the process. Meanwhile, the House of Evangelista sit amongst the audience, alongside teacher Helena, watching as the students of the dance school, including Damon Richards, perform the choreographed dance perfectly, leaving everyone standing, cheering, and applauding the dancers. Blanca expresses appreciation to Helena for the opportunity. Meanwhile Angel gets silicone injections from Clarissa.
Cast[]
Main Cast
- Evan Peters as Stan Bowes
- Kate Mara as Patty Bowes
- James Van Der Beek as Matt Bromley
- M.J. Rodriguez as Blanca Rodriguez
- Dominique Jackson as Elektra Abundance
- Billy Porter as Pray Tell
- Indya Moore as Angel
- Ryan Jamaal Swain as Damon Richards
- Charlayne Woodard as Helena St. Rogers
- Dyllon Burnside as Ricky
- Hailie Sahar as Lulu Abundance
- Angelica Ross as Candy Abundance
- Angel Bismark Curiel as Lil Papi
Guest Cast
- Christopher Meloni as Dick Ford
- Kathryn Erbe as Dr. Gottfried
- Jordan Carey as Tasha
- Andrea Frierson as Clarissa
- Alexia Garcia as Aphrodite
- Cecilia Gentili as Ms. Orlando
- Jari Jones as Butt Smack Woman
- Larissa Laurel as Lina
- Jeremy McClain as Cubby
- Jason A. Rodriguez as Lemar
- Julia Rose Tresvant as Juicy Nipple
Videos[]
Trivia[]
- First appearance of Aphrodite, and Miss Orlando.
References[]
External Link[]
